many-faced capital in which the _beau monde_ was held in detestation or
scorn; still the house had certain pretensions, boasting a courtyard and
a porter's lodge. Madame Rameau, instructed to mount _au second_, found
the door ajar, and, entering, perceived on the table of the little salon
the remains of a feast which, however untempting it might have been in
happier times, contrasted strongly with the meagre fare of which
Gustave's parents had deemed themselves fortunate to partake at the board
of his betrothed; remnants of those viands which offered to the
inquisitive epicure an experiment in food much too costly for the popular
stomach--dainty morsels of elephant, hippopotamus, and wolf, interspersed
with half-emptied bottles of varied and high-priced wines. Passing these
evidences of unseasonable extravagance with a mute sentiment of anger and
disgust, Madame Rameau penetrated into a small cabinet, the door of which
was also ajar, and saw her son stretched on his bed half dressed,
breathing heavily in the sleep which follows intoxication. She did not
attempt to disturb him. She placed herself quietly by his side, gazing
mournfully on the face which she had once so proudly contemplated, now
haggard and faded,--still strangely beautiful, though it was the beauty
of ruin.

From time to time he stirred uneasily, and muttered broken words, in
which fragments of his own delicately-worded verse were incoherently
mixed up with ribald slang, addressed to imaginary companions. In his
dreams he was evidently living over again his late revel, with episodical
diversions into the poet-world, of which he was rather a vagrant nomad
than a settled cultivator. Then she would silently bathe his feverish
temples with the perfumed water she found on his dressing-table. And so
she watched till, in the middle of the night, he woke up, and recovered
the possession of his reason with a quickness that surprised Madame
Rameau. He was, indeed, one of those men in whom excess of drink, when